Customs to introduce new handling fee for online purchases from outside EU

Finnish Customs will introduce a new €2 handling fee from November for online purchases arriving from outside the EU, said Customs in a press release on Friday.

In addition, product identifiers must be provided for low-value consignments.

The handling fee will be applicable all online purchases arriving from outside the EU regardless of the value of the purchase.

The €2 handling fee must be paid for each goods item in the consignment. Products of the same kind that have the same commodity code and, in some cases, the same country of origin can be provided as one goods item in the customs declaration.

“The handling fee will help the EU cover the control, monitoring and handling costs that arise when goods are sent from outside the EU directly to consumers”, said Senior Customs Officer Antti Hästbacka.

The handling fee must be paid in conjunction with the customs clearance of the goods. If the seller of the goods is covered by the IOSS scheme (Import One-Stop-Shop), where the customer pays the Finnish VAT to the seller upon purchase, the seller or their representative will declare the parcel and also pay the handling fee. The seller’s representative is usually a transport company.

From November, product identifiers (PIDs) must also be provided for online purchases worth no more than €150 that arrive from outside the EU. The customer does not need to provide the PIDs if the seller of the goods is covered by the IOSS scheme, because in that case, the customer does not personally have to declare the parcel.

“In other cases, the customer should take note of the product identifiers in the order confirmation or on the seller’s website of the online store when purchasing the goods”, said Hästbacka.

Three product identifiers (PIDs) must be provided for the product in conjunction with the customs clearance: standardised manufacturer product identifier (S-PID), such as EAN or ISBN (obtained from the seller), non-standardized manufacturer product identifier (NS-PID), such as model or product number (obtained from the seller) and the seller’s own merchant product identifier (M-PID).

From the beginning of July, all online purchases arriving from outside the EU have also been subject to payment of customs duty.